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Expanding Horizons

SINGAPORE — Driving down the open road as the sun sets, the sea glittering off the cliffside — there’s just a certain romance to that, whether or not you’re a petrolhead, especially when you live in gridlocked Singapore. With the new Forza Horizon 2 game, you can now experience (virtually) the adventure of driving down southern Europe in a top-end Ferrari or McLaren.

SINGAPORE — Driving down the open road as the sun sets, the sea glittering off the cliffside — there’s just a certain romance to that, whether or not you’re a petrolhead, especially when you live in gridlocked Singapore. With the new Forza Horizon 2 game, you can now experience (virtually) the adventure of driving down southern Europe in a top-end Ferrari or McLaren.

But while you can take leisurely drives to soak in the amazingly rendered scenery and weather in this open-world driving game, Forza Horizon 2 is, at its core, about racing. This means that more often than not, everything is a blur as you hurtle through, which is a pity given how beautiful the game can be.

The game is centred around the Horizon festival, a huge party across parts of Europe. You drive from city to city to take part in racing events to show off your driving skills and earn enough money to buy a new car or upgrade your current one. Driving well also earns you experience points, which you can use to upgrade your skills.

Whether you’re driving along winding highways or racing through city centres, every road can now become part of the race, and some races will bring you off-road into farms. There’s quite a lot of racing to keep you busy, with varied scenarios to keep things interesting.

If you’ve ever wanted to race a Ferrari against a fighter jet, this is your chance. Not enough to do? There are many more side missions scattered across the open world before you head to the finale of the Horizon festival, not to mention hidden secrets to discover. And with more than 200 cars available — including land rovers and trucks — you’ll be pretty busy collecting them all.

If you’ve played Forza Motorsport 5, your Drivatar — a computer version of you that learns how you drive — carries over into Forza Horizon 2. This means that the open world is filled with other simulated drivers who are also racing to another location, making the world feel a little more alive and the driving a bit more unpredictable. Pay close attention and you might spot a friend driving past.

Forza Horizon 2 is not perfect, of course. Car handling can feel loose — more fun, but driving can be difficult without assists if you haven’t played a Forza game for a while. Going off-road, while thrilling, can be tricky when you get waylaid and end up missing a checkpoint. This pushes you back to before you missed it, costing you precious seconds.

And there’s one other thing missing: The ability to wind down the window and have the wind blow through your hair.

Still, Forza Horizon 2 is a fun trip through southern Europe by car, with amazing visuals to boot. While racing fans can also look forward to Drive Club, Project Cars and The Crew on their consoles by this Christmas, Forza Horizon 2 is first out of the blocks and has more than enough gas in it to be worth a ride. If you enjoyed the previous Forza Horizon, this is definitely a step up.

Rating: 4/5

Forza Horizon 2 is available on the Xbox One and the Xbox 360 for S$69.90. The Xbox One edition was used for this review.

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